Progress logging with org-mode

Progress logging with org-mode

[Tom Weissmann]

A feature of org-mode I have started to use a lot is the clock, to record the 
amount of time I spend on different tasks. I'll start a clock in the task or 
subtask I'm working on, and then clock out and add a note when I move to a 
differnt task.

The result is often something like this:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
* Tasks
** Task 1
*** Sub-task Foo
    CLOCK: [2007-09-28 Fri 11:52]--[2007-09-28 Fri 12:53] =>  1:01
    - Finally cracked the Foo problem
      CLOCK: [2007-09-28 Fri 10:50]--[2007-09-28 Fri 11:50] =>  1:00
    - Dealing with problems continuing Foo-ing
      CLOCK: [2007-09-28 Fri 09:50]--[2007-09-28 Fri 10:50] =>  1:00
    - A good start to Foo
      
      This is some information that I don't want to forget about doing Foo.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

As you can see, the clock notes track my activity within a subtask, but the 
indentation seems odd, and the useful information about the subtask is in 
danger of being swamped by a mass of reverse-ordered progress logs.

Has anyone got some suggestions of better ways to do this?

(preferably using Org-mode because I really like it ;)
Tom SW

Re: Progress logging with org-mode

[Carsten Dominik]

Hi Tom,

On Sep 29, 2007, at 3:01, Tom Weissmann wrote:

> A feature of org-mode I have started to use a lot is the clock, to  
> record the
> amount of time I spend on different tasks. I'll start a clock in the  
> task or
> subtask I'm working on, and then clock out and add a note when I move  
> to a
> differnt task.
>
> The result is often something like this:
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> ----
> * Tasks
> ** Task 1
> *** Sub-task Foo
>     CLOCK: [2007-09-28 Fri 11:52]--[2007-09-28 Fri 12:53] =>  1:01
>     - Finally cracked the Foo problem
>       CLOCK: [2007-09-28 Fri 10:50]--[2007-09-28 Fri 11:50] =>  1:00
>     - Dealing with problems continuing Foo-ing
>       CLOCK: [2007-09-28 Fri 09:50]--[2007-09-28 Fri 10:50] =>  1:00
>     - A good start to Foo
>
>       This is some information that I don't want to forget about doing  
> Foo.
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> ----
>
> As you can see, the clock notes track my activity within a subtask,  
> but the
> indentation seems odd,

I cannot reproduce the indentation you are getting - are you  
re-indenting the lines
with TAB or so?

> and the useful information about the subtask is in
> danger of being swamped by a mass of reverse-ordered progress logs.

Actually, I have been bothered by that too.  Maybe we should have
a special CLOCK drawer and make all those entries go in there....

- Carsten

Re: Progress logging with org-mode

[Tom Weissmann]

Carsten Dominik <dominik <at> science.uva.nl> writes:

> I cannot reproduce the indentation you are getting - are you  
> re-indenting the lines
> with TAB or so?

In fact what happens is that any CLOCK below another one that has a note is
indented more than the CLOCK above it:

Eg (from a real org-mode file this time)

  CLOCK: [2007-10-03 qua 14:36]--[2007-10-03 qua 14:40] =>  0:04
  - Updating wiki about mlc.
    CLOCK: [2007-10-03 qua 13:28]--[2007-10-03 qua 14:36] =>  1:08
  - Debugging mlc.
    CLOCK: [2007-10-03 qua 11:46]--[2007-10-03 qua 12:10] =>  0:24

This also means that any body text underneath the clocks will be indented
differently depending on whether there are notes to the clocks.

> > and the useful information about the subtask is in
> > danger of being swamped by a mass of reverse-ordered progress logs.
> 
> Actually, I have been bothered by that too.  Maybe we should have
> a special CLOCK drawer and make all those entries go in there....

Yes, that would make sense. I thought about it but then decided I didn't like
the idea of having drawers for all the subtasks - as if that would be noisier
than having lots of CLOCK entries in all the subtasks!

I'll try tweaking the clock-out function to put completed clocks into a drawer,
and see how I like it.

Cheers,
Tom SW.

Re: Re: Progress logging with org-mode

[Carsten Dominik]

On Oct 4, 2007, at 12:08, Tom Weissmann wrote:

> Carsten Dominik <dominik <at> science.uva.nl> writes:
>
>> I cannot reproduce the indentation you are getting - are you
>> re-indenting the lines
>> with TAB or so?
>
> In fact what happens is that any CLOCK below another one that has a 
> note is
> indented more than the CLOCK above it:

The point is that the next clock entry is inserted *before* the 
previous ones,
and in my setting this does not change the indentation of the entries 
that were
already there...

- Carsten

Re: Progress logging with org-mode

[Tom Weissmann]

Carsten Dominik <dominik <at> science.uva.nl> writes:

> The point is that the next clock entry is inserted *before* the 
> previous ones,
> and in my setting this does not change the indentation of the entries 
> that were
> already there...

But it only as long as they're not indented by some foolish user, afterwards. I
confess I tweak, split and merge clocks quite a lot, as well as re-edit their
notes, which is why I care about them having robust and consistent indentation.

Very often I come back from a meeting, clock out, and then split the time
between multiple tasks that happened to be treated by the meeting. It's probably
cleaner to think of each meeting as an individual task, but when you're logging
time with a view to billing, that's not always what you want.

Cheers,
Tom SW